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safety_caesars got me to watch Gundam Wing with her, when we first moved in together. I need to talk about this a little bit because it will sort of set the stage for all of the future flailing that's going to happen here. She and I rewatched Evangelion back in May/June-ish while I was caring for the Weasley Kittens, and it was really fun and interesting to just rewatch old animes and flail and talk about them. (For a mental image that should basically cover all of "us rewatching Eva", please picture the two of us drunk as fuck, buried under blankets (yes it was May), clinging to each other in a state of terrified and desperate cathartic mindfuck as we scream at the creepified disgustingness that is all of the Evas -- and then, three seconds later, engage in hilarious debate about how we hate every character a little, and breasts. The end.)
Anyway. We had rewatched all of Avatar: The Last Airbender, we had watched some other stuff, and Becky says to me, do you want to watch Gundam Wing? Sure, I said. I was just a tiny bit too old to catch it at the time it was out on Toonami -- and this will become very important: I missed the entire first incarnation of the fandom as a whole. I didn't really know a lot about it except that there were boys and robots and it was back from the 90s. Becky said she had liked it a lot and was interested in seeing how it stacked up now; I said, hey, it was popular and even if I don't get into it, I'll be glad that I watched it. So we started watching eps during dinner (and often after dinner, into the second bottle of wine, because we make really good life choices).
Here's how that rewatch went.
So of course I wanted to dive right into the fandom – never mind that it hasn't existed for like 10 years, jerks – but I realized the very first time I sat down to writeshameporn anything that I definitely hadn't caught enough of the details of the backstories to really feel great writing anything more than, I don't know, clown blowjobs really dumb stuff. And I was finding other people who were all about a tiny little fandom revival – not just safety_caesars but katmillia, and then I met notraffic and it all went downhill towards the SHAME TRAIN – but I was like, oh god oh god what the fuck happened in Luxembourg? Where the fuck was that in the show. I don't even know. And I knew that Becky didn't want to rewatch it again, right away (and duh, she knows what happened), which was cool, so originally I thought maybe I'd just read up on stuff online, get episode recaps or read the GW wiki or something like that.
Then I remembered that
So I now have the series on my iPad, and I watch 1-2 episodes every time I run, depending on the length of the run. :D The English dub is pretty different than what's in my head, and it's also easier to run with headphones and English – it can be hard to read subtitles when I'm doing sprint intervals – and I don't really give any fucks that I'm watching a kid's cartoon in a public gym, whooooops.
So anyway, let's talk about my feelings on episodes 01-05.
General Thoughts on the English Dub
- Quatre's English voice is hot
- Wufei's English voice is super hot
- Duo's American voice makes me laugh a lot. I continue to imagine him as a Ninja Turtle just because of the voice actor's inflections and all.
General Thoughts upon Rewatching
- By the second episode I could really understand why I was so confused. Like, conceptually I understood that the 5 Gundams were going to different places on the earth, but like – Heero and Duo meet up, and then Trowa and Quatre run into each other, and I was like wait. wait. so they are close. So they are… not close. What. The. Fuck. It is really hard for me, in this show, to figure out who is physically WHERE. It's something I am trying really hard to keep track of this time. Apparently Gundams travel really quickly across the planet.
- Other stuff was confusing too, like – Quatre's Maguanac army. It took me seriously like 4 Quatre episodes to be able to tell the Maguanac mobile suits from the other ones, so I was like, dude, why does this guy have [Leos/Aries/whatevers] following him around?? I seriously did not really understand what was up with the Maguanacs for a while. When they showed up in battle I just thought they were more mobile suits and I was really confused when Quatre didn't fight them too. This is how dumb I am, people.
- I'm getting a lot more of the Oz backstory this time, I think; I guess we'll see when it starts to get all twisted up and complicated, but, yeah.
Specific Thoughts on These Episodes
- I really like the way you learn so much about the pilots in their first and second appearances on screen. I want to talk about Heero in a separate point. But you know right away that Duo is this sort of happy, gritty, crazy-like-a-fox motherfucker who would be funny if he weren't ready to kill you; I had kind of forgotten how much I adore Duo's character type until he started showing up on screen again. Trowa is a badass who blows his first mission to smithereens to get it done – but then joins a circus and pets lions, I am sorry, I may never get over Trowa and the goddamn circus thing, ever, it's like 200 years in the future and there are still traditional circuses with clowns and shit, I like that giant robots are TOTES OKAY but my brain gets stuck on THE GODDAMNED CIRCUS. Thanks brain. Anyway, it shows two sides of Trowa, the ruthless trained soldier, and the guy who likes giant fluffy animals more than people (WHY I RELATE TO TROWA SOMETIMES 101). This thought was going somewhere. With Quatre, I think the scene that really got me this time was when he's watching all the flamingos on Sandrock and he says, "It's beautiful. Do they have any idea how beautiful it is?" talking about the earth and I am just like GUT MY HEART, WHY DON'T YOU. And Wufei is I think making a lot more of an impression on me this time; I want to wait to talk about him because he's one of the characters that kind of slipped through my fingers the first time through.
- Heero. Okay, so, I'm going to throw these thoughts out there upon this first rewatch: I was kind of like, hey, Heero, what the fuck. I realize that the show is trying to set up the self-destruct thing; I realize this is part of Heero's character and characterization, and that his dedication to the mission is important. But it seriously almost seemed… too easy for him. Like, doesn't he even care about getting his Gundam back and maybe being able to do more actual missions? Nope, fuck that, he did ONE mission and it's time to blow it the fuck up. It seems to me like his dedication to "the mission" is actually really short-sighted in the beginning here; he isn't looking at the broader picture. He's simply looking at the tiny fact that the Gundam might get into enemy hands. And rather than elaborately planning to go get it, he… elaborately plans to blow it up. It seems to me that all the energy he put into plotting that thing with the missiles could have gone into an infiltration-and-recovery plan just as easily. It's interesting to me. I am like, dude. I don't know.
- Relena. I had, um, forgotten just how fucking obnoxious her fan club was in these early episodes. I had reservations about Relena and I think a lot of it is my own personal ick factor against characters who think they know everything, characters who always think their interpretations have to be right: Relena has this obsession with Heero and it continues to continuously get her into trouble. But instead of I don't know staying away or what, she's all like "OH OKAY I will go out to the base and follow Heero it can only end well right", although I also realize that if she hadn't been so meddlesome the story may not have gone the same way at all. I am just saying. My feelings: they are complicated. I ended up being all about Relena, but here at the beginning, I am pretty unsure about her.
- I had seriously forgotten just how absolutely gay the flute-and-violin scene between Trowa and Quatre is. AND THIS IS FROM SOMEBODY WHO SHIPS THEM. My god, is that not a little over the top? The first time Becky and I watched it I am pretty sure I made a face; I made the same face this time while running. It's a pleasantly amused but a little bit cringing face, it's cool.
- I had forgotten that Relena meets up with the one crazy doctor and he tells her some about Heero. TOTALLY FORGOTTEN. So I guess… in some ways I can buy her sort-of-obsession with Heero building up based on their encounters AND that information. It's just very interesting – this is one of those things I had a super hard time keeping track of when I was still all OOH SHINY GUNDAM WHAT JUST WENT BOOM, the little details of who knows what and who was where.
I'm running tomorrow and probably Friday, so I'll share my thoughts as I go.
ALSO: need to obtain some GD Gundam Wing icons omg
safety_caesars got me to watch Gundam Wing with her, when we first moved in together. I need to talk about this a little bit because it will sort of set the stage for all of the future flailing that's going to happen here. She and I rewatched Evangelion back in May/June-ish while I was caring for the Weasley Kittens, and it was really fun and interesting to just rewatch old animes and flail and talk about them. (For a mental image that should basically cover all of "us rewatching Eva", please picture the two of us drunk as fuck, buried under blankets (yes it was May), clinging to each other in a state of terrified and desperate cathartic mindfuck as we scream at the creepified disgustingness that is all of the Evas -- and then, three seconds later, engage in hilarious debate about how we hate every character a little, and breasts. The end.)Anyway. We had rewatched all of Avatar: The Last Airbender, we had watched some other stuff, and Becky says to me, do you want to watch Gundam Wing? Sure, I said. I was just a tiny bit too old to catch it at the time it was out on Toonami -- and this will become very important: I missed the entire first incarnation of the fandom as a whole. I didn't really know a lot about it except that there were boys and robots and it was back from the 90s. Becky said she had liked it a lot and was interested in seeing how it stacked up now; I said, hey, it was popular and even if I don't get into it, I'll be glad that I watched it. So we started watching eps during dinner (and often after dinner, into the second bottle of wine, because we make really good life choices).
Here's how that rewatch went.
- First ~1/3 of the show: huh, this is alright… it's kind of confusing and complicated for a kids' show and I'm having trouble keeping track of who is where and what is which, but I like these cutefaced characters a lot. It's fun! More wine please.
- Second ~1/3 of the show: Okay, these characters are actually really awesome; I'm still not sure how much of the story I'm picking up here, and every time I think I have it under control somebody switches sides or changes positions or otherwise mindfucks me, but I'll keep watching for PRETTY, AMAZING BOYS IN ROBOTS. I can see why people liked this, I get it.
- Final 1/3 of the show: JESUS IN A BARREL OF FUCKS WHEN THE HELL DID THIS SHOW GET SO AWESOME AND HOW DID IT CREEP UP ON ME AND WHY DO I HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHAT HAPPENED. WHAT IS HAPPENING. I AM NOT EVEN PREPARED. WHEN DID ALL OF THE CHARACTERS BECOME MASSIVE BAMFS AND WHY AM I GAY FOR ALL OF THEM OH MY GOD MY HEART, IT'S EVERYWHERE JESUS CHRIST PLEASE TELL ME THERE IS MORE
- after the last episode: *Becky and I just staring at each other and repeating, "Oh my fucking god," for about twenty minutes*
So of course I wanted to dive right into the fandom – never mind that it hasn't existed for like 10 years, jerks – but I realized the very first time I sat down to write
safety_caesars but katmillia, and then I met notraffic and it all went downhill towards the SHAME TRAIN – but I was like, oh god oh god what the fuck happened in Luxembourg? Where the fuck was that in the show. I don't even know. And I knew that Becky didn't want to rewatch it again, right away (and duh, she knows what happened), which was cool, so originally I thought maybe I'd just read up on stuff online, get episode recaps or read the GW wiki or something like that.Then I remembered that
- I run a lot every week, and it's on a treadmill now because it's cold
- I have an iPad
- Running is boring
- Running to Gundam Wing would be less boring
- I could watch the episodes with the English voices and learn something about the dub, too
So I now have the series on my iPad, and I watch 1-2 episodes every time I run, depending on the length of the run. :D The English dub is pretty different than what's in my head, and it's also easier to run with headphones and English – it can be hard to read subtitles when I'm doing sprint intervals – and I don't really give any fucks that I'm watching a kid's cartoon in a public gym, whooooops.
So anyway, let's talk about my feelings on episodes 01-05.
General Thoughts on the English Dub
- Quatre's English voice is hot
- Wufei's English voice is super hot
- Duo's American voice makes me laugh a lot. I continue to imagine him as a Ninja Turtle just because of the voice actor's inflections and all.
General Thoughts upon Rewatching
- By the second episode I could really understand why I was so confused. Like, conceptually I understood that the 5 Gundams were going to different places on the earth, but like – Heero and Duo meet up, and then Trowa and Quatre run into each other, and I was like wait. wait. so they are close. So they are… not close. What. The. Fuck. It is really hard for me, in this show, to figure out who is physically WHERE. It's something I am trying really hard to keep track of this time. Apparently Gundams travel really quickly across the planet.
- Other stuff was confusing too, like – Quatre's Maguanac army. It took me seriously like 4 Quatre episodes to be able to tell the Maguanac mobile suits from the other ones, so I was like, dude, why does this guy have [Leos/Aries/whatevers] following him around?? I seriously did not really understand what was up with the Maguanacs for a while. When they showed up in battle I just thought they were more mobile suits and I was really confused when Quatre didn't fight them too. This is how dumb I am, people.
- I'm getting a lot more of the Oz backstory this time, I think; I guess we'll see when it starts to get all twisted up and complicated, but, yeah.
Specific Thoughts on These Episodes
- I really like the way you learn so much about the pilots in their first and second appearances on screen. I want to talk about Heero in a separate point. But you know right away that Duo is this sort of happy, gritty, crazy-like-a-fox motherfucker who would be funny if he weren't ready to kill you; I had kind of forgotten how much I adore Duo's character type until he started showing up on screen again. Trowa is a badass who blows his first mission to smithereens to get it done – but then joins a circus and pets lions, I am sorry, I may never get over Trowa and the goddamn circus thing, ever, it's like 200 years in the future and there are still traditional circuses with clowns and shit, I like that giant robots are TOTES OKAY but my brain gets stuck on THE GODDAMNED CIRCUS. Thanks brain. Anyway, it shows two sides of Trowa, the ruthless trained soldier, and the guy who likes giant fluffy animals more than people (WHY I RELATE TO TROWA SOMETIMES 101). This thought was going somewhere. With Quatre, I think the scene that really got me this time was when he's watching all the flamingos on Sandrock and he says, "It's beautiful. Do they have any idea how beautiful it is?" talking about the earth and I am just like GUT MY HEART, WHY DON'T YOU. And Wufei is I think making a lot more of an impression on me this time; I want to wait to talk about him because he's one of the characters that kind of slipped through my fingers the first time through.
- Heero. Okay, so, I'm going to throw these thoughts out there upon this first rewatch: I was kind of like, hey, Heero, what the fuck. I realize that the show is trying to set up the self-destruct thing; I realize this is part of Heero's character and characterization, and that his dedication to the mission is important. But it seriously almost seemed… too easy for him. Like, doesn't he even care about getting his Gundam back and maybe being able to do more actual missions? Nope, fuck that, he did ONE mission and it's time to blow it the fuck up. It seems to me like his dedication to "the mission" is actually really short-sighted in the beginning here; he isn't looking at the broader picture. He's simply looking at the tiny fact that the Gundam might get into enemy hands. And rather than elaborately planning to go get it, he… elaborately plans to blow it up. It seems to me that all the energy he put into plotting that thing with the missiles could have gone into an infiltration-and-recovery plan just as easily. It's interesting to me. I am like, dude. I don't know.
- Relena. I had, um, forgotten just how fucking obnoxious her fan club was in these early episodes. I had reservations about Relena and I think a lot of it is my own personal ick factor against characters who think they know everything, characters who always think their interpretations have to be right: Relena has this obsession with Heero and it continues to continuously get her into trouble. But instead of I don't know staying away or what, she's all like "OH OKAY I will go out to the base and follow Heero it can only end well right", although I also realize that if she hadn't been so meddlesome the story may not have gone the same way at all. I am just saying. My feelings: they are complicated. I ended up being all about Relena, but here at the beginning, I am pretty unsure about her.
- I had seriously forgotten just how absolutely gay the flute-and-violin scene between Trowa and Quatre is. AND THIS IS FROM SOMEBODY WHO SHIPS THEM. My god, is that not a little over the top? The first time Becky and I watched it I am pretty sure I made a face; I made the same face this time while running. It's a pleasantly amused but a little bit cringing face, it's cool.
- I had forgotten that Relena meets up with the one crazy doctor and he tells her some about Heero. TOTALLY FORGOTTEN. So I guess… in some ways I can buy her sort-of-obsession with Heero building up based on their encounters AND that information. It's just very interesting – this is one of those things I had a super hard time keeping track of when I was still all OOH SHINY GUNDAM WHAT JUST WENT BOOM, the little details of who knows what and who was where.
I'm running tomorrow and probably Friday, so I'll share my thoughts as I go.
ALSO: need to obtain some GD Gundam Wing icons omg
no subject
Date: 2012-01-03 03:30 pm (UTC)You can see my response to this ridiculous pairing nonsense in this post from 2006: I'd Like To Say
I was one of the first to adopt the new notation, and me and the creator of it made a comm for it AND THE WORLD ENDED. Seriously, I lost SO MANY friends and was kicked out of a comm over SOME SYMBOLS. X.x Since then, I have made fic, but kept a serious distance from the fandom. Honestly, the fandom ruined the love for a lot of people, and especially when I got really into the Hikago fandom, I realized that GW was just the worst fandom ever. People were mean, rude and VERY sensitive if they even have a SLIGHT notion that you MAY be stepping on their toes a little - not that they gave a flying fuck about stepping on YOUR toes. It was pure madness. The het fans hated the yaoi fans and vice versa, and after the Great Pairing Notation War of 2006, the yaoi fandom essentially cracked in half. It was ugly and ridiculous, and there are still people today who hate me over some math symbols, and others who think I don't count because I wasn't in the fandom in 2001 when it really took off - apparently coming in in 2005 took all my validity as a GW fandom kid away.
IT WAS SO BAD. I have never ever ever ever been in a fandom that cared so much about who tops - there were literally whole groups of people who would flat out refuse to read any story if Duo topped (which is why I prefer Duo to top; I'm trying to balance it out XDDD) and the worst part was the writers who wrote the worst fics, as far as bad cliches and horrible seme/uke abuse go, were the Big Name Faces in the fandom and smacked around anyone who even seemed like they might not agree with EVERYTHING THEY'VE EVER THOUGHT EVER. And of course, they had all these groupies to come and yell at you, too, since they were practically mindless drones anyway. Duo acting like a little bitch girl and Heero being BIG STRONG DOMINEERING MAN? Awesome. Loving the concept of equality in a relationship so much you have a notation for it? WORST AND MOST INSULTING THING TO EVER EXIST.
...Yeah. YEAH. There just are no words.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-03 06:22 pm (UTC)But then I look at stuff like... the sheer amount of crack!fic that existed in this fandom. Fics that read like Lifetime Movies, where someone owns a coffee shop and the others are customers. or just plan crack fic -- seriously, I have read a really long fic in which Duo is a fucking doll and it like blew my mind it was that good. Or the ridiculous fanart I've seen, where I am like "there is a dolphin nosing Duo's nuts, this person has to be the biggest troll ever" and I am just like... FF fandom (my main fandom) NEVER got that crazy, I am really almost jealoud.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-04 02:15 am (UTC)Oh god yes, the top/bottom wars are just ridiculous. I like some variety in my smut - top, bottom, missionary, doggie style, hanging from a ceiling, upside-down on a pogo stick... XDDD WHATEVER STRIKES YOUR FANCY. Though I'm pretty vanilla - location/position is usually as wild as I get in fiction... that and my affinity for using odd substances for lube. In Hikago, I will seriously NEVER LIVE DOWN THE SWEATER CAKE. Cake filling for lube? Yeah, I wrote that. XDDDD No one will ever let me forget. -.-;;;
AHEM.
My point is, who gives a crap about who's being penetrated and who's doing the penetrating as long as there's some freaking hot hot sex happening? I DON'T. SWITCHIES PLZKTHNX. SWITCHIES MEANS I MIGHT GET MORE SEX SCENES OUT OF THE DEAL, AND I SUPPORT THAT AT ALL TIMES.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-04 03:05 am (UTC)I AGREE WITH ALL OF THIS. Not only is switching more FUN and more INTERESTING but it is also more REALISTIC? I think anyway?
no subject
Date: 2012-01-04 03:19 am (UTC)From what I understand, switching is most common, though there are a few people with preferences. I doubt many people get all ridiculous about it, though.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-04 03:34 am (UTC)I just don't understand why you'd get upset with it in fanfiction. I'm not the kind of person to be like, "It's just fanfiction!" - I take it as seriously as everybody else, *sometimes* - but seriously, it isn't worth all the piss and vitriol.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-04 03:47 am (UTC)